Birthright

[shadow]

I played a few sessions in Birthright before and thought that it was a great setting. All the politics and realm management could concievably get boring, but my group simply chose to forgo any rulership and play straight up a adventuring campaign. What made the setting unique was the fact that it was unique, yet familiar, and the world actually made sense. Unlike Forgotten Realms, and many other campaign settings that seemed like they were composed of various "kewl" elements thrown haphazardly into a blender, Birthright had believable cultures and believable histories. There was a definate medieval feel to the setting, moreso than many other "kitchen sink" settings. However, most of all it was refreshing to see standard races and monsters presented in a different light. Elves were not all good, pacifists; they were very fae-like and potentially just as dangerous to humans as the orogs or goblins. Halflings had a connection to the shadow-world and could see etheral, and shadow walk. And goblins weren't savage humanoids that only existed to be slaughtered by adventurers, they had their own kingdoms. Magic was rare, yet powerful... Monsters were legendary... In short, it was a great setting!

 

[Tonguez]

Birthright was a good medieval setting with a logical framework and interesting backstory - and thats what made it better than the other DnD settings (ie Greyhawk and Faerun)

How they then added interesting races (including different human cultures), made the monsters unique entities and gave the ability for characters to be influential figures without having to be high level superheroes made it all the more interesting

Personally I'd suggest avoiding 'regent' level play and taking a step down - ie influential but still hands on.

 

[Glyfair]

It centered on the concept that all of the PCs were some sort of nobility (king or other feudal leader, high priest, high wizard, whatever).

This was one facet of play. A good percentage of the rules assumed you'd take these roles. It wasn't required, however. You could run a standard D&D campaign within the setting without personally dealing with managing the various domains and such.

I think Birthright would be an ideal setting for a hybrid online-tabletop campaign. Take care of the domain turns online. When tabletop play is called for, set up a session to get together and play. If a player wouldn't justify playing his main character, he could have a secondary character to run (or just skip that session).

I could see a campaign where everyone's main character runs his own country and has a secondary character in everyone else's domain.

 

[Silveras]

I think Birthright would be an ideal setting for a hybrid online-tabletop campaign. Take care of the domain turns online. When tabletop play is called for, set up a session to get together and play.

I pretty much did exactly that, though with different people playing the characters on each level. My tabletop players were the adventuring heroes, and my on-line friends (including Templetroll, above) played the Domains of my world. This put a whole new spin in "a noble hires a bunch of adventurers" to take care of a problem.

It was off to a decent start when the tabletop game dissolved, so there was little/no reason to continue the Domain play.

 

[Silveras]

I have very little knowledge on the setting and just got quite a few books for it. So, in the great tradition of placing the wagon in front of the horse now I'd like to know if its any good.

The Good part is that the setting had a unique flavor that felt like an internally-consistent place. The countries were well-detailed and balanced, and the general AD&D rules had been modified to fit the setting; adding racial modifiers for various types of humans, for example, because in this setting all humans were NOT quite equivalent.

The Bad part is that many of the new rules were tied to the setting and offered no alternatives. For example, the setting's flavor included a "development vs. nature" conflict, in that developing land for more civilized uses reduced the magical power there. While this served to balance the Realm Spells (spells that affected whole regions at once) in the rules, it did so in a way that is/was not easily adapable to other settings.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

My favorite TSR setting. Ran two concurrent campaigns, mostly the same players in both, one competing regents game, one adventuring party game, though the adventuring party changed on occassion - including a Chaotic Good Goblin Adventuring Team... Who's main purpose in existence seemed to be embarrassing the Paladin who had converted them to death...

The Auld Grump

 

[Khairn]

I played it for about a year in the late 90's and enjoyed myself

Most of my own observations have been echoed in the post's above, i.e. great monsters, history and flavor. Our grouped played a "troupe style" of play with Birthright, whereby each player had 3 characters to play at the various levels of the game (Noble, Advisor, Squire). This really worked out great for us.

Overall the game was well thought out and expanded on the standard D&D paradigm by introducing elements of a "nation building" strategy game, a simplistic naval and land based mass-combat system, and a revised character generation system that enabled players to begin play as actual rulers of a nation.

And besides that the bloodlines and Abominations were very kewl!

 

[Teneb]

Hmm, your troop idea is a good one Devyn. My group played quite a bit of Birthright, in large part because at the time we were in the "take over the world" mentality anyway, and this was a convenient way to play that out.

I think the part I liked the most was the kingdom management. Raising armies and sending diplomatic missions to other kingdoms was a lot of fun. I think the battle resolution system was a little clunky (I like a little more tactics in my battles), but it worked. With the numerous large battle systems availble for 3(.5)e, I think the game would probably be even more fun.

 

[ephemeron]

I pretty much did exactly that, though with different people playing the characters on each level. My tabletop players were the adventuring heroes, and my on-line friends (including Templetroll, above) played the Domains of my world. This put a whole new spin in "a noble hires a bunch of adventurers" to take care of a problem.

It was off to a decent start when the tabletop game dissolved, so there was little/no reason to continue the Domain play.

!!!

I've wanted for years to run a strategic-level game and a traditional RPG campaign in the same setting, with each affecting the other. Have I been looking for Birthright without knowing it?

...and, since nothing is exactly what I'm looking for, how much work would it take to convert Birthright to 3e or to adapt the domain rules to a different setting?

Also, can anyone tell me about the quality of the RPGNow scan?

 

[Cinderfall]

Birthright 3E

Hey there. I'm actually running a Birthright 3E campaign. There was a dedicated fan base that actually produced a 3E conversion pdf. They obtained official permission to do so from WoTC. Not at conversion manual mind you, but a fully functioning 3E (not 3.5 but easy to convert) campaign setting. Actually very well done. There were some spelling/pdf errors in the document but they didn't effect the overall book. Plus it was free. I took the pdf to Kinkos and had them print me up (and bind) a manual. Cost me about 20 bucks.

The campaign setting is based around very small kingdoms (many of which are about 70 miles across) ruled by characters possessing divine bloodlines passed down through family generations (or obtained through ceremony and/or murder). Hence the name of the setting. These bloodlines can give the characters various powers, including things like (but not limited to) improved senses, enhanced social presence, stat boosts, resistances to various dangers, even various forms of invulnerability. These powers can be improved as well - by either drawing upon the magic of the kingdom or through ursupation (similar to Highlander).

The idea is that the PCs will pick a "home" kingdom that they either rule or serve as lieutenants for - though as many people have already pointed out, standard adventuring is more than possible. There are many plot hooks already installed (if you own the 2nd ED stuff, which I largely acquired from Ebay). Plus the game makes motivation much more easy to come by - the PCs have something to fight for (their home kingdom) right from the start. And it's a perpetual goal that can have satisfying benchmarks such as repelling invasions, improving the economy, expanding the kingdom's/guild's/temple's influence, etc. Pretty much any adventure you can think of can be worked in.

I've been running it for over a year, though our game is kinda winding down now. My campaign was based around the idea that the PCs started as lieutenants and eventually one (the heir-to-be) would take over. I structured it this way because 3E is skill based and running the kingdom calls for various checks (diplomacy, administration, etc) - I didn't want my 1st level PCs to get run-over by the other regents. Plus this allowed me to build up the campaign flavor and events, making it a more natural transition to leadership. Unfortunately, a series of PC deaths has derailed many of my storylines and we haven't gotten to the PCs taking over yet.

I like the setting very much. It provides a huge amount of information (again if you own the 2nd ED stuff) but is open enough that you can put on whatever kinda spin you want. The various iconic NPCs become well known - even more so than most campaigns (IME) because they WILL have an effect on the PCs kingdom at some point. My players hate the Baron of Ghoere, fear Rhoubhe Manslayer, and have become rather impressed with the son of The Mhor, Lord Michael. Plus the game does give a distinct feeling to each culture.

There are a couple of areas I wished were more fleshed out, however. The game can be largely centered around politics and social interaction, a well defined treatment on social structures would have been very nice to have, something to give those of us with little working knowledge of Medieval society a solid base to work from. Especially Knights. Another thing that kinda puts people off is the spelling of names and what-not. I've been told it's based on Welsh style language - in any case some people find in difficult. For example, mentioned above, Rhoubhe is pronounced "Rove". Some people like it, others loathe it. Elvish can be hellish to decipher.

The setting is low volume magic - the world is very magical, but wizards and magic items are a relative rarity. Make no mistake, magic is potent, especially realm magic, it's just not common. Also the game pulls from more "traditional" fantasy and history, which can be seen in the artwork.

The website was originally www.birthright.net, but upon recent inspection it has undergone a major revamp. Plus I couldn't find any of the files they used to have (including the campaign book). I've heard that they are making it into a full on retail version - though I do not know for sure.

For those interested in acquiring the setting I would recommend locating the Birthright Basic Boxed Set (it has several indispensible books and maps) and as many of the Player's Secrets Kingdom guides as you can lay your hands on. Specifically Roesone, Tuornen, and Endier. One last thing, you WILL have to tweek things and make adaptations (I added between 3 to 5 levels on to most of the NPCs listed so they were more 3E compatible)

If anyone is interested, and if I can find it, I can email them the 3E campaign setting pdf (it is 8.5 megs if I remember correctly). Hope this was helpful.